


Deaths' Memoirs

by Mother_Istria



Category: Original Work
Genre: ANY REAL PEOPLE WHO APPEAR ARE ALREADY DEAD, Angst, As in I do as much as I can to describe mutilation without being too graphic, Asylum patients - Freeform, Burned at the stake, Dead anime mom, Death, Death as a character, Death in Childbirth, Gen, I bury my straights and bisexuals and asexuals too, I promise I'll try to make this as not-weird as possible, Implied/Referenced Abuse, I’m a gay pls don’t accuse me of the bury your gays trope, Mentioned lesbians, Mistreatment of patients, Not really but let me have fun, Probably should've made that a tag quite a while ago, Referenced mass shooting, Referenced racism, Someone dies every chapter, Tags to be updated as the story continues - Freeform, Teenager Death, VIOLENCE IS RARE BUT IT SHOWS UP BE WARNED, Vague Gore, Very minimal comfort for the angst, What's the opposite of emotional mirroring?, cursing, everyone is fucking dead, lots of death, references to lynching, someone really excited to be a mom
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-04-04 17:45:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14025387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mother_Istria/pseuds/Mother_Istria
Summary: Death has existed for as long as there has been life. Death has seen all that was, and shall see all that is yet to come. And if that is so, what are all of the things Death has seen? What does Death remember?





	1. You probably know me already, but I'll introduce myself anyway

**Author's Note:**

> This is based on a tumblr post I can't find anymore, please forgive me.

Hello.

I presume you know me. After all, most of you humans seem to have quite a fear of me. Perhaps you are one of them. But I digress; it would be rude to simply expect you to know me. I shall introduce myself then.

I have been called many names over the ages. "The Grim Reaper", "The Angel of Death", "The Great Equalizer", some names so old, no human tongue has the sounds to be able to pronounce them.

I have been given many faces over the ages. Some depict me as a human skeleton wearing a black robe. I believe that one is the most popular. Others have given me a body with flesh. They all look different. Some have wings, or animal parts, or have me divided among multiple beings. Those ones confuse me most.

(The majority of these depictions seem to be male, which irritates me some, I won't lie. I'm not like you humans, I don't fall within your binaries.)

Many peoples and cultures have given me names and faces, desperate as they were to make me seem like them. 

To seem like something tangible.

To seem like anything other than an ever-advancing force of nature that will take anything that lives, however long that may take.

But what I am is not something that can be changed.

When the first living thing came into being, I was there. I took it when the time came.

And when the time comes, I will take the last living thing as well.

I was there when your ancestors came into this life. I was there when you came into this life. I will be there when your descendants come into this life.

I was there to take your ancestors when the time came. I will be there to take you when your time comes. I will be there to take your descendants when their time comes.

I'm sure you must have guessed by this point. But out of courtesy for you, I'll tell you anyway.

In your words, I am Death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, first chapter is UP! This is gonna be fun, I feel it!  
> Also the "I'm not like you humans, I don't fall within your binaries." line is meant to imply that Death doesn't care about the gender binary of humans, and would rather not be pushed into one or the other. They/Them pronouns for Death, please!  
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


	2. Patient No. 522

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There once was a woman, locked away for insanity...

She had a name once. But once she passed through the doors of the asylum, it was only a matter of time before it was lost. No one bothered to even try to remember. She couldn’t anyway, so it’s hardly like it mattered. Similarly, no one had bothered to remember her reason for being institutionalized. 

She may have been pretty once. I can’t tell. Beauty among humans, I’ve found, is subjective. “In the eye of the beholder”, as some have found to put it. I can only really know how she appears now. And how she appears now… It seems strange I didn’t need to escort her from life before this moment.  
She’s pale, with nothing to her aside from her skin, bones and internal organs, but I suppose that last one is an unneeded addition for you, who understand the strange hyperboles you humans use. Her eyes are dull, and sunken into her skull. She has some hair, limp and thinned over her head. It might have been a vivid red if it had been cared for in life.

But really, it’s the marks that cover her frame that I believe tell the most about her life. And her death.

They are everywhere, old and new. Dirt, vomit and blood that was never washed off, and eventually seeped into the skin, staining it. Wounds that remain open, possibly infected. Scars ranging in age from years to mere days old. If she were still alive, some would still be healing. As pale and fragile as she appears, it would be reasonable that a medical professional would see that she wouldn’t survive losing any more blood than she already had.

The doctors who saw her were clearly lacking in a human emotion called compassion.

She’s running now, towards myself. 

(A rather strange reaction, really. I’ve escorted innumerable beings from life, and many seem to wish they could run away from myself.)

It’s clear to see that she hasn’t run in a very long time, perhaps so long that she doesn’t remember how. Her legs keep knocking together, bending in the wrong way, twisting and tripping over herself and nothing. But she doesn’t stop running.

Her arms are outstretched.

She’s holding me.

She’s holding on tightly, as though I were a long-lost friend.

She’s laughing.

This woman holds Death in her arms.

And yet, she laughs.

And now she’s crying. Why is she crying? She’s still laughing, so she can’t be sad. Can she be? Isn’t laughter an expression of joy in humans?

(It’s for this reason I reject the idea of having emotions like the living do. They’re far too confusing and unpredictable in others, let alone in oneself.)

“I’m sorry, but I’m just so happy!” She speaks between sobs. Neither her laughter nor her crying have subsided. If anything, they seem to have become more intense. Her grip hasn’t loosened either, which would be a problem if I needed to breathe. 

“I’m finally free of that place, that horrid, horrid place. No more doctors, no more knives, no more needles, and no more screams! You’ve come for me at last, at long, long last and I can finally be rid of it all!”

“You’ve been expecting me, then.” 

(My voice must sound strange to her. Neither male nor female, and it isn’t between them, either. Yet, it doesn’t sound like neither of them. Truthfully, it sounds a bit strange even to myself.)

“We all do. All of us. We wait for the day you come to save us from a place that makes Hell seem like Paradise.” 

Her crying has stopped, as has her manic laughter. She doesn’t bother to wipe the tears from her face. 

“Really. We’ve been called devils, and I’m sure that compared to… That place, even Hell would seem kind and beautiful.”

Ah, she is a woman of faith then. 

(Yet another thing about humans I do not understand, the stubborn clinging to some great and higher power than yourselves. Though, I cannot say these powers do not exist any more than I can say they do.)

She continues to cling to me in some fashion as we walk. Truthfully, it isn’t necessary, but I’ve found that humans need time to accept the reality of what has occurred to them, and some take comfort in another creature willing to listen. And of course, others are simply more cooperative if they believe that I’m taking them somewhere. 

(I’m not, not really. We may as well be walking in place. There is no time nor distance in my… I guess what could be called my home.)

She continues to talk. Her memory is with her now, or perhaps it’s a story she made, a fantasy that she has confused with her memories. She still doesn’t remember her name, but I don’t believe she wants to. She thinks she might have been a wife and mother once. Her children, if they existed at all, were her loves and her life. Her husband, if he existed, was once a love. She says he died. She isn’t sure if she killed him, or perhaps he died on his own. She still doesn’t remember why she was institutionalized, but it hardly matters. She accepted this a long time ago. 

A point arrives. A point I may dread if I were to allow myself to feel dread, to care at all about those whom I escort from life. 

She is ready.

Ready to leave my company.

“My friend?” 

I turn what I suppose would be my head towards her. It’s hardly often a human would refer to me as their friend.

“I need to ask… What comes next?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, I'm actually updating this bitch again!  
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


	3. Theories Of Everything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is quite literally just a thinly veiled tribute to Stephen Hawking, I will not lie to you.

This man does not walk beside me. He cannot. But his chair moves for him. He speaks to me, though a voice that was made for when his vocal cords couldn’t. He tells me that this isn’t an afterlife, for such a thing doesn’t, can’t, truly exist. That this is simply the final imaginings of his mind as he dies. I say nothing in return, because even though I cannot prove him right, I cannot prove him wrong either. 

(Really, who is to say that everything that exists isn’t simply the dying thoughts of some creature we do not know or understand?)

He continues to speak, in numbers and logic and theories of where the universe will go next. Theories of everything that ever was and ever will be. 

He seems at peace with it all. 

We reach the point where it ends. He tells me that now, he is truly going to die. I say nothing, because I know that nothing I say will affect where he goes next. 

(Truthfully, I don’t know where he would go next, or if he’ll go anywhere at all. It’s curious.)

He moves forward, alone.

And suddenly, I am left alone.

I feel as though his words will ring for a long time to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this chapter was so short, I couldn't find more words to put into it that wasn't just me trying to take up more space, get a higher word count. But really, this chapter didn't need it. People accept their death in their own time, and some people take less time than others.  
> Until next week!  
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


	4. The Lynched Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter, as you can probably tell, we meet a man who was lynched by a mob.

We walk in silence. His skin, dark as rich soil, is cut, bruised, burned, scarred, and in some places, missing. 

Some humans would call him a criminal, who received just punishment. Others would call him a victim. 

I have no inclination to agree with either.

I don’t concern myself with human morality.

I see what is in front of me. 

What I see in front of me is a man who seeks no words of comfort from me. They are worth nothing to him now, and we both know it. 

He only looks forward, his face as strong as a stone. He doesn’t look at me. He doesn’t look at himself. He looks towards where he is going.

(People like him either stay for mere instants, or what could feel like eternity to them. There really is no middle ground.)

We walk together in silence for a long time.

His wounds do not heal. Those who walk with me remain as they were when they died, and do not change. Regardless of the state they were in. Holes in his flesh remain, part of the practice employed in his death. Bruises circle his throat. Scars from well before he died show prominently on his skin. New cuts and lacerations mar his skin. They are deep wounds. Parts of him are burned as well.

His death must have been agony to endure. 

His point comes. He is ready. But he doesn’t know what he is ready for.

(I’ve escorted literally billions of things from life. I can see when one is unsure of where they will go next. Most wonder if they will enter an afterlife or not. His concern seems to be if he will simply be forced to endure more of the treatment. I can’t say if he will or won’t.)

He looks at me.

For the first time since he arrived to me.

And I can see the question on the tip of his tongue.

“What comes next?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me if I fucked this up. 
> 
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


	5. The Witch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A woman burned was burned as a witch, but was the accusation false or not?

She comes to me with fire in her eyes and curses on her lips. She comes to me burned and charred, displaying the method of what could be called her execution.

Burned at the stake for being a witch.

(I’ve noticed that humans are cautious of anything they do not understand. They either revere it or they fear it. They never seem to make attempts to understand it, this woman’s “Magic” included.)

I can’t tell if she has even seen me yet. She is filled with rage. She turns to look behind her, where she may think she can see those who accused her and killed her.

(And perhaps she can, I do not know. The human mind is impressive to say the least, so it shouldn’t be excluded from the realm of possibility that a human can see what they knew in life.)

She begins to scream. At first, it is simply noise. There are no words, only her own emotional agony. Her pain.

Then she stops.

She rises to her feet.

She screams again.

But the screams have changed.

She cries in words. I couldn’t tell you the tongue she spoke in, because truthfully, I don’t know what you humans would call it.

(It is a language you know, I’m sure. But I can understand what a human says regardless of the language they speak. And the human can always understand me. I’ve never needed to learn how many languages humans can possibly speak, nor their various names.)

Her words are harsh and angry. She curses those who accused her, those who damned her, those who said nothing and simply let this happen, those who built the stake she was burned upon, and those who set her ablaze. 

She curses all of them, and she seems to put every piece of her into the words.

Her voice lowers from its scream.

And she says one final thing to them all.

“You burned me. This was your mistake. You turned me into ash and embers, and I swear on my own damn grave, the embers will always remain. I will sleep in your lungs, in your beds, in your homes, anywhere that can burn. I will sleep, but I will not die. I will remain. I will sleep until you even think to raise another hand or point another finger at an innocent. When that happens, I will rise. I will burn you all. Your beds, your homes, anywhere that can burn and even from within, I will rise and I. Will. BURN.”

(I’m sure it isn’t worth much mention, but cursing those who accused her of being a witch even though claims her innocence of the “Crime” of being a witch seems quite ironic. Or perhaps she has simply become what they believed of her.)

Her words hang in the empty space around us.

She turns around.

She takes a step.

She takes another one.

And a third.

She crumples.

Her body, burned and blistering, convulses.

She screams.

These screams are different from those before. 

Tears fall down her face.

She is crying. 

Her screams are pained now, nothing like the fierce cries of hatred only a moment ago.

She is hurt.

She is in pain.

I wrap myself around her now, lightly and carefully.

(I find that in cases where the human is in pain, I must be incredibly delicate in how my form, or I suppose what could be a form, touches them. When in pain, some humans crave physical touch and comfort. Others Don’t wish to be touched much, while some cannot be touched without being caused more pain. The woman in front of me seems to be very solidly in the first group, but I believe that’s because her pain is mostly emotional, not physical.)

She and I remain as such for what would seem to her to be a long time. Her body shakes and convulses as she alternates between sobs and screams. 

Slowly, the screams become less frequent, and the sobs begin to quiet. She clings to me, needing to feel something other than this pain. Her grip doesn’t loosen.

(Humans like her almost manage to draw emotion from me. It is difficult to see someone in this degree of pain and not wish to comfort them and empathise with them. Difficult, but not impossible.)

She has stopped crying. Her breath is evening out. I slowly remove myself from around her, and help her slowly rise to her feet.

Her breath is still a bit shaky, but she stands.

We don’t walk far before I feel her point.

(This seems to happen when humans cry before they walk with me. I suppose that since it helps level their emotions, they don’t need too much time to accept that which has occurred.)

She takes a deep breath.

She asks, in a voice that is raspy from screaming but yet sure and determined,

“What comes next?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't know whether this lady is a witch or not, I just had the image in my head of a woman who was burned for being a witch and cursing out and damning those who accused her. I'll let you all decide.
> 
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


	6. The Mother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the story of a woman who wished for nothing more than to be a mother...

She is tired and weary. I almost expect her to ask if I could carry her.

(Which I have done before, many times. I am an equalizer, not needlessly cruel.)

But she doesn’t ask.

I don’t think the thought ever even occurred to her to ask.

Instead, she walks alongside me. We walk slowly, but we walk. She never asks me to carry her or to support her, and I will not offer.

It would be rude to interrupt her anyhow. 

She died while giving life. Some have seen it as poetic. Others see it as a tragedy. Some once told me they considered it as equal to dying in battle.

(I haven’t escorted any of those people in, what I would presume to be, quite a while. Perhaps the culture died out.)

She talks about the life she created. How she’d wanted it for so long, and finally she had it. Even if the process of bringing the child she’d carried into the world killed her, she swears that she died a happy woman. 

She held the child once in her arms. 

And she died shortly thereafter. 

She continues talking about her child. How the nursery was decorated, how long she and her wife had spent trying to choose a name for their child, how they had only narrowed their list down to a single page a few days ago, how they had agreed to decide once they saw the child with their own eyes, and all of her hopes, dreams, and wishes for the child she had only been able to hold in her arms for a few short moments.

All of her hopes, dreams, and wishes for a child she wouldn’t be able to raise.

There have been tears on her face from the moment she came to me, and now more fall afresh. 

She turns to me now, and holds out her arms.

I wrap myself around her, and she cries. 

She laughs through her tears.

 

She sobs, heartbroken.

She cries, holding a hand over her stomach to try to sooth her aching insides.

And she does this all at once.

(In my experience, humans cry for many reasons. In my experience, however, they don’t cry for many reasons simultaneously.) 

After a time, she wipes her eyes.

“I’m so sorry, you must find all of this dull. Imagine, talking to Death about life. About birth!”

She laughs, loudly. 

(She’s probably tired and so a bit “Out of it”, as humans say.)

“That isn’t your job! That isn’t your job at all! It’s the exact opposite of your job!” 

She continues laughing.

She keeps doing this until she’s crying again.

(I have also noticed that humans can cry if they laugh hard enough. Human emotional reactions a bizarre to say the least.) 

She wipes her eyes once more, and picks herself up; looking what can be taken as ahead of us with a smile full of determination.

(Tears aid in balancing human emotion. It seems strange, I know, but it is true.)

“I don’t know how much longer I need to go, but I will continue.”

She looks at me, still smiling.

“I want to find out where I’ll go next.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To that one person who commented asking me for a “Female couple”: Did you mean lesbians, because if you did, here’s one for you.
> 
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


	7. Body In A Mass Shooting

He comes to me with bullet holes in his body, one that looks far too young to be meeting me.

You can guess why he has arrived.

He sighs and begins walking, no grief for what he has lost written on his face. I walk beside him.

He begins to talk.

“Don’t feel sorry for me, alright tall, dark, and grim?” 

His tone is acidic, but tired.

“I feel no emotions towards those I escort from life, human. You shall receive no sympathy from myself.”

“Good. Hardly fucking matters, anyway.” 

He laughs, bitter and cynical.

“I’m a statistic now. Just another fucking corpse.”

(I’ve seen many humans with his circumstances surrounding their death. It might surprise you to learn how many have adopted this same attitude.)

We continue walking for a while. 

(Humans who die in this manner usually need time to reach their point. They require even more if they adopt the cynical attitude this one seems to have.)

“Hey, Grim? Uh, can I call you Grim?”

“If you wish. It makes no difference to me.”

“Cool.”

He is silent for a moment.

“You’ve probably seen this all a million times, right?”

“There have been a great many before you who have died in your same manner, if that is what you wish to know.”

He flinches a little when I say the word “Died”.

“Yeah, that’s it. I just… I mean, you, you’ve been around since forever, right?”

“Since there has been life, I have existed.”

“Right. It’s… Well, I mean… Does, do things change?”

“Things change, yes. It would seem to be the only true constant that exists.”

He sighs, exasperated. I suppose that wasn’t the answer he was looking for.

“Fuck, you sound like a language teacher. Do things get better in situations like these? Do people actually start paying attention and change things so that people stop fucking dying?”

I take a moment to consider my answer. I can tell he doesn’t know what answer he wants, even though he seems so sure that he does.

He has asked a difficult but intelligent question, regardless of how he has phrased it.

“Most often, it seems that things do become better. People stop dying as often for the same reason. Sometimes it is because others begin to pay attention. Other times, those who suffer force those in power to hear them. Others still, as I have heard it said, rise and devour their oppressors.”

I allow him a moment to consider my words. 

“Well then, Grim, I guess we’ll just need to see what happens next, huh?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, I did everything in my power to approach this topic with the utmost caution and respect. Please don't be upset with me if I got something wrong, just let me know. I will fix it.  
> Second of all, I feel the need to warn you all that I'm experiencing a bit of writers block, and on top of that I have a new job that I'm trying to figure out. I might go on hiatus for a while, but I assure you that I will continue this story! It's just going to take some time.
> 
> Do you have an idea for a character or cause of death that you would like to see? Check out my tumblr, at hopefulblazeexpert.tumblr.com and shoot me an ask!


End file.
